Amaranthine

Cait’s motivation to leave bed and report on what they’d encountered inside (and faaaaaar outside) Cabrini Green was immeasurable. In the sense that it would be impossible to measure nothing.

Kennedy, in an adorable attempt to regain some dignity, had used her tail to rip Cait out of her (making a wet squelching sound and releasing a creamy waterfall that had to be far more embarrassing than just waiting a goddamn minute), flipping herself over, and pulling Cait and Lira tight to other side of her. To look at them now, curled up against her chest like harem girls, one might think Kennedy had been the dominant partner in that encounter.

Despite not needing it, the temptation to sleep the deep sleep of victory was difficult to resist after an experience like that, and with Kennedy’s soft skin as the perfect pillow, Cait had no qualms with surrender.

So it was probably good, then, that the decision to move was made for her.

Move was probably the wrong word. Instead, she was pulled, boob pillow and all, onto a floor of hard, well trodden boards. An instant later, Lira popped into existence on Kennedy’s other breast, moaning her disapproval at being in any way disturbed after the work she’d just put in.

Even through a deep post-nut relaxation, sudden teleportation raised Cait’s hackles a bit, though the feeling had become familiar enough she was pretty certain what had happened. She raised her head, getting her bearings.

They’d fallen onto a massive stage in a bigger auditorium, dreamlike in scale and decoration. Velvet curtains the size of mountain ranges in the distance framed the edge of the wooden expanse she currently rested on. The auditorium itself extended past a horizon line, each seat filled by silent, spectral faces that still somehow radiated expectation.

Even if she hadn’t then seen Qi, Willow, and Director Swan seated around an ornate wooden conference table a few feet away on the stage, Cait would have had a pretty good guess as to who’s soulspace they currently occupied.

The woman in question let out a sigh that belied deep self control as she ran her dark, discerning eyes over Cait’s naked body. Cait’s own eyes rested on those perfect red lips, twisted enticingly as The Director held one between her teeth. Then, she watched those lips turn down into a frame as her eyes landed on the naked form of her adoptive daughter next to Cait, and gestured to Willow.

Immediately, the three were covered in what Cait would consider their ‘default’ outfits: athleisure for her and Lira, and rocker-goth chic for Kennedy.

Willow’s hands didn’t stop moving when the clothes appeared, and after a moment, she summoned a short monster made entirely of white sludge.

“Hey, what the fuck!?” the monster said, voice suspiciously similar to Gwyn’s.

Next to her, an unfamiliar man in a very familiar hat appeared in an obvious panic. Beady eyes locked on Willow, and a more impressive voice than Cait would have expected from Breastman’s human form yelled; “Put me back right now!”

Before he’d even finished speaking, a purple monster, familiar, but sans hat materialized above him. Cait caught on immediately, and dove on it as it started to whip wildly. It found her as inconveniently invulnerable as any of her enemies had, before it disappeared, reappearing in a cage on the table.

“That won’t be necessary, Breastman,” The Director said calmly, as though this had all been expected. “Willow assures me the whole of the animating force is not removed during her little séances, your mental defenses should still be well in place. If anything, the fact we got a piece of whatever is inside you will be beneficial to this discussion.”

“Oh phew!” Breastman said, rising from where he sat, remarkably unconcerned by his nudity. He was an almost aggressively average middle aged white man, complete with paunch and patchy carpet of body hair.

Maybe he’s just used to going au natural now, though normally he doesn’t have a, sorry buddy, unimpressive and easily recognizable set of human genitalia on display.

“Hey!” Gwyn, still very much appearing to be a semen elemental, called again. She clearly wanted to say something more, but just sort of whined, waving helplessly at herself.

Willow’s cruel chuckle was echoed by the ghostly audience like a studio laugh track, as she waved a hand. Gwyn was now swathed in her familiar hoodie and leggings instead of a Nickelodeon SlimeTime amount of cum.

Eyes now able to open, she looked with utter bewilderment at the hairy ass of her boyfriend a few feet in front of her.

“Who the fuck is this, and what the fuck is going o—” she cut off as Breastman turned around, her eyes locked on the hat above his perplexed expression.

“Babe?” she asked, hesitantly, and, damn it, she almost kept the disappointment out of her voice entirely.

This was when Breastman finally seemed to realize he was naked, and not in a way that was fun for everyone. He blushed redder than Lira’s hair and covered his bits with his hat, revealing a balding pate.

Cait’s glare stopped Willow’s smirk in its tracks, and it seemed like the Witch didn’t want to find out it Cait’s ‘Inviolable Soul’ let her perpetuate violence even inside someone else’s. She waved her hand again, and Breastman was decked out in denim and flannel, which honestly really worked for him, in a dopey, down-home sort of way.

“Uh, hey, Gwyn,” he said, trying his best but unable to maintain eye-contact. It was honestly kinda tough to watch on both sides. Gwyn was doing her best, but if Kennedy had revealed her true form to be Breastman’s actual body, Cait would have had trouble schooling her face as well, and at least Cait was actually into, ya know, people.

“Hey!” Gwyn responded, voice artificially high. The fact that she even could look right at him, instead of shy glances spoke volumes. The man inside was not her type. “So, this is you, huh?”

“I… I don’t want it to be,” Breastman responded, scratching at the back of his neck awkwardly. “I mean, it isn’t not anymore. I don’t think.”

Cait kipped up, striding over to put a hand on his shoulder. She pointedly caught his eye, mimicking his posture, huddled and nervous. Then she stood straight, puffed out her chest, turned to Gwyn, and smiled. She just had to trust he’d do the same.

C’mon, idiot, she’s not that shallow. Remind her it’s you.

She felt him shift, copying her pose. He was actually pretty tall, when he stood up straight he was eye to eye with Cait, maybe half an inch shorter. They both towered over the 5 foot nothing Gwyn.

“It is me, for now though,” he said, voice just that much firmer. He lifted his hat back up from his junk to his head, tightening it back over his dome. The smile was audible in his next words. “It’d have to be, right? I’ve got the hat, and Isacc told me AEGIS just copyrighted this thing.”

Gwyn’s eyes flicked from Cait’s to lock on to Breastman’s as she smiled back, giggling and blushing just a little bit. There might not be the naked lust there her eyes usually contained looking at him, but there was a lot less blatant disinterest. Cait patted him on the back, and vacated his side. As she sat at the table, she saw Gwyn had replaced her, arm wrapped around his.

The Director, seated next to Cait, had a faint smile that held something close to motherly pride as the pair approached, taking their seats. Cait got it, honestly. The guy had made so many strides forward as a person, despite spending the last few months as far away from being one as one could physically be. For maybe the first time, the Director touched Cait without lascivious intent, squeezing her hand in companionable solidarity.

“Right,” The Director said, releasing Cait’s hand, and replacing her own, much more characteristically, on Cait’s upper thigh. “As imagine you all can deduce, we will be discussing that.” She indicated the snarling monster in the center of the table. Its cage was too small for it to really thrash, but its body was semi-solid enough that it never really stopped moving, pointing its gaping, pulsing maw at each of them in turn.

“I’ll admit, I’m less surprised than I’d like that Des Moines’ favorite tentacle monster is a dead ringer for an extradimensional invasion force, but the predictability doesn’t make it any less concerning,” she continued.

It turned out, there was nothing like a perceived attack to reignite Gwyn’s feelings for her lover fully. She pulled him tight, arm nearly disappearing between her breasts.

“Breastman is not one of them!” she insisted. “He fought like all of us, he’s the only reason we got those civilians out!”

The Director was just as pleased by the look of blissful relief on Breastman’s face as Cait was, if the pleasant strokes of her fingers on Cait’s inner thigh were anything to go by. Somehow, she still seemed surprised when Cait slipped a hand beneath her skirt though, eyes going wide for a microsecond as Cait’s fingers explored her silky skin.

“The defense of your… teammate is as commendable as it is unnecessary, Miss Stine,” The Director responded, fingers straying ever higher. They really didn’t have to go that high before the points of her nails trailed across Cait’s shaft, which would now be entirely unmissable were she suddenly required to stand in front of the class. “Breastman’s motivations are, as ever, beyond reproach.”

Her eyes went hard as she continued; “However, it is more important than ever to acknowledge that Breastman is not alone in his body.”

Cait shifted uncomfortably at the implication, only for The Director to grab her shaft tight, meaning if Cait wiggled any more, she’d be jacking herself off. Not exactly what she was going for right now. That said….

“We need to ascertain what we’re dealing with here,” The Director said, releasing her vice grip on Cait’s shaft, but replacing it with slow, soft strokes of her palm.

Bitch, you will not make me cum in my big-girl pants twice, Cait vowed, diverting most of her willpower to fighting the default eroticism of public play, and VERY MUCH ignoring the look on Lira’s face. The foxy redhead wore a grin that said she had absolutely figured out what was going on. It was impressive, honestly, the link didn’t work the same in these spaces, and The Director had stayed stone faced. Cait thought she had too, but by process of elimination, knew she hadn’t.

“Willow,” The Director said, making eye contact with her friend like her index finger wasn’t rubbing the slit of Cait’s cock through her leggings, “what can you tell us about the nature of Breastman’s link to these things, spiritually speaking?”

“It may be better to show you,” the Witch replied, waving a hand between Kennedy and Cait. The visual representation of their bond, breathtaking in its complexity, the way the patterns of their souls interlinked so beautifully, so completely.

“This what I’m calling a Wavebond,” she continued. Like always happened when she looked at these bonds, her words came slower, focus fighting against being lost in the shifting designs. “It may be pointless to categorize, because to be honest, the one between Cait and Kennedy here is the only one I know to exist. It is the most closely two souls can conceptually be linked, existing in a harmony unseen amongst many singular souls. It is impossible, and I hate it.”

Kennedy chuffed out a laugh, and Cait coughed when Kennedy’s fingers found her left hand, intertwining with Cait’s own. This had coincided with Cait’s right hand growing bolder, riding up high enough that her little finger brushed up against the soft, wet heat of The Director’s, apparently unguarded, pussy. Either Kennedy was being willfully ignorant, or she was fucking with them. Their bond was being illustrated for all to see: what Cait felt, she felt, and right now, that was….

“And how does that relate to Breastman and these invaders?” The Director asked, clearly just giving Willow a good transition point. She was also giving Cait’s poker face a hard fucking time, hand now wrapped gently around her shaft, tugging against the fabric with sharp, controlled strokes.

“I’m glad you asked,” Willow said, dismissing the Wavebond and summoning another, this time from Breastman to the monster and…. And another far far away, to something else. Where the dancing lines between Cait and Kennedy had moved in harmony, creating impossible works of intricate art with each and every shift, this pattern was at war.

It was impossible to tell, in the chaos, how Cait’s mind could pick out which side of the conflict was which being. Even then, she wasn’t sure. But one set of lines, as much as there could be said to be two sets, resisted the animalistic attacks of the other with a stoic kind of fluidity. Fuck, it looked like it hurt. It also looked like the stoic lines didn’t care.

Above the chaos, a pattern that seemed entirely separate shot off into the sky. Cait, impossibly, recognized it despite its constant, sickeningly mutable nature. It was an imperfect portion of the God-Pattern, burned into her memory from Willow’s first demonstration.